AUTHOR: Wu, Yi'an
TITLE: Spatial Demonstratives in English and Chinese
SUBTITLE: Text and Cognition
SERIES: Pragmatics & Beyond New Series 126
YEAR: 2004
PUBLISHER: John Benjamins
Announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/15/15-3031.html
Ring Mei-Han Low, Department of Linguistics, University at Buffalo, State
University at New York
INTRODUCTION
Using the method of discourse analysis, Wu in this book offers a detailed
comparison between the uses of English spatial demonstratives (this, that;
here, there) and those of their counterparts in Mandarin Chinese (zhe, na;
zheli, nali). In a well-organized manner, Wu meticulously describes her
results and observations of the study of two sets of discourse data, one
from an experimental procedural task, and another from two pieces of
narrative discourse (Winnie-The-Pooh and Baohulu de Mimi) with their
respective Chinese and English translations.
Besides the similarities and differences between the two languages' uses
of spatial demonstratives, a major finding reported by Wu in this book is
that the non-proximal demonstratives in both languages (that and there in
English and na in Chinese), when compared to the proximal ones (this and
here in English, and zhe in Chinese) are more prone to semantic
reinterpretation and have developed a greater variety of extended uses
(e.g., uses in which the basic deictic meaning of the demonstrative has
lost). Wu proposes that this phenomenon, along with other asymmetrical
patterns between proximal and non-proximal demonstratives reported in the
study, can be explained in terms of a cognitive notion she calls "deictic
force". The strength of the "deictic force" (p.51), which is supposed to
exist abstractly between the "deictic center" (i.e., the perspective or
the "ego" center) and the referent denoted with the demonstrative (p.99),
may affect how and to what extent a demonstrative would develop its
variety of uses in displaced contexts.
In this review, I will first give a synopsis summarize individual
chapters, before providing a general evaluation of the book.
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